Confidence
by evieeden
Summary: Seth worries about being the youngest of the wolves. Advent story written for 21st December.


**Happy 21****st**** December everyone. I apologise that you're getting this story a day late, as my internet failed yesterday. Hopefully that won't spoil your enjoyment of the story anyway. **

**Unfortunately due my lack of internet, this story has not been betad except by me, so please be kind and don't point out all the mistakes I've made. I know they're there although I've tried to weed out the worst of them, lol. And as always, I do not own anything to do with Twilight.**

**Confidence**

They all stood on the back porch of Sam and Emily's place and looked at the wolf in front of them.

"I don't know," Jared drawled. "Turn around in a circle, Seth, and let's get a good look at you."

He snickered and Kim smacked him on the arm reprovingly.

The wolf huffed, but obligingly stood up and then padded around slowly in a loop, letting them get a good look at his new appearance from all angles. Once he was facing them once more, he flopped back down onto his stomach, resting his large head on his paws.

There was silence for a minute until Bella finally spoke up and broke it.

"Well I think you look great, Seth."

"Yeah," the other girls immediately chimed in to add.

"Definitely just as fierce as the rest of pack," Emily agreed.

Paul and Jared couldn't stop themselves from laughing and hooting out loud.

"Fierce?" Paul scoffed. "He looks like a Labrador."

"Paul!" Bella punched him in the side and scowled at him.

He offered her a wide grin in response. "Well, he does," he argued.

The wolf in question huffed again and then closed his eyes against his brothers' taunts.

While Paul and Jared were openly laughing, the other wolves were biting their tongues, trying not to show their own amusement. It was blatantly obvious that Jake, Quil and Embry were biting their tongues and while Sam looked sympathetic, he also had the remnants of a smile dancing across his mouth.

The trouble was that right now Seth really did look like an overgrown puppy.

He had phased at the same time as his sister, just a month earlier, but whereas Leah was already an adult when she changed into a wolf for the first time, Seth had been just fourteen years old, although he had celebrated his birthday since then. Despite growing rapidly since his change, his human body was still catching up and the rest of the pack had theorized that he wouldn't yet grow to his full size – either as a wolf or a human – until he was a little older.

What that meant, however, was that in his wolf form, he wasn't as sleek or as ferocious-looking as the rest of the pack.

Even Leah, with her smaller, thinner form, looked like the dangerous adversary that she was.

Seth, however, looked exactly like the 'fluffy puppy' that Quil and Embry had dubbed him while on patrol one day.

Overhearing their offhand comment, Seth had taken offence and his boyish pride had made him demand to know what the others really thought. The last thing he wanted was to be out on a hunt and to have the leeches laugh at him, rather than fear him.

So he had marched over to Sam's where all the wolves and imprints were gathered and asked everyone to give their honest opinion on his lupine appearance. After a warning glance from Leah, they had all traipsed outside and he had phased for them. However, he now wasn't sure if he had really wanted their opinions after all.

When phased he really did look like he still had a lot of growing to do. His fur was less sleek than the other wolves'; it was softer and stuck up a lot more, which was why no-one could really disagree with the fluffy description. Both his paws and his ears were too big for his body and his normal genial nature meant that when he was happy or excited, his tongue lolled out of the side of his mouth.

All of the girls thought he was absolutely adorable. All of the wolves had promptly fallen about laughing.

Always protective, Leah, who was stood to one side, glowering at the rest of the pack for the insult to her brother.

Emily tried again to smooth things over. "Don't listen to them, Seth. You look nothing like a Labrador. You just need to grow into your new body a little, but that will come with time."

"Yeah," Quil said gleefully. "You just need to grow and then, when you're finally a big boy, you'll look a lot scarier than a kitten."

Grinding her teeth, Leah's arms dropped to her side and she stalked towards her clueless pack mate, ready to strangle him. Perhaps sensing the impending bloodshed, Sam clapped his hands together loudly, stopping her in her tracks.

"Come on, everyone. Back inside so Seth can phase in peace."

With continued snickers, the pack trailed back into the house, laughing and continuing to crack jokes about the 'puppy' out back.

With a further jab to the side and a warning glare, Bella shoved Paul towards the door and then sat down onto the top step of the porch. Paul shot her a wounded glare.

"Babe? You're not coming inside too?"

He tried to pout and widen his eyes beseechingly at her, but she just thought he looked ridiculous.

"No, I'm not." She frowned at him. "Because you're being mean."

With a quick glance around him to see who was listening – only Leah, Jake and Sam remained in the backyard – he took a step towards her. "Bells, come on. You know I was only joking," he whined.

She tried to keep the glare on her face. "Well, it was inappropriate."

Sensing a thawing in her frostiness, he raised his eyebrow at her. "But Babe, you love it when I'm inappropriate." He flicked his tongue obscenely and she shrieked in embarrassed outrage.

"Go! Inside!"

She pointed towards the door and with one last leer that made her blush, Paul obeyed.

When she turned back, everyone was looking at her speculatively; even the wolf in the yard looked somewhat knowing.

"Oh, shut up," she muttered.

Jake laughed at her and then came over to sit next to her on the step, grabbing Leah's hand and dragging her along with him on the way.

"Go phase, dude," he told Seth.

Blinking, the wolf raised itself to its full height and then ran towards the cover of the forest.

"Lee." Jake tugged on his girlfriend's hand. "Why don't you sit down?"

The older girl stayed where she was, staring defiantly at her mate.

"You know, looking at me like that just makes me hot," Jake told her.

Leah rolled her eyes, but allowed him to pull her down and wrap his arm across her shoulders. A few seconds later, Seth emerged from the forest, human again. Jogging up to the porch, he collapsed easily in front of them, staring sullenly down at the ground.

"I'm sorry Paul was picking on you," Bella apologised to him. "He doesn't mean anything by it; he just doesn't know when to keep his big mouth shut."

She said the last part louder than the rest and they were rewarded when a shouted "sorry, Seth" came from inside the house.

"It's okay," Seth replied glumly, picking absently at the blade of grass by his side.

"No, it's not," Leah said swiftly. "They should know better."

Her brother ignored her and carried on pulling up half the garden.

"Look, Seth..." Jake began, but then paused when both Leah and Bella shot him a warning look.

He held his hands up in protest and leaned back, tugging Leah closer against him.

"Seth," Bella started. "I know that you don't want to look younger than all the others, especially as a wolf, but you are young, and that's not necessarily a bad thing."

"It is when I'm supposed to be fighting vampires," he muttered. "I mean, what's the point of all this, protecting the tribe and all, if the leeches are going to wet themselves with laughter every time they see me? I'm hardly scary looking? I'm smaller than all the others; I don't need to look weaker or more stupid than them too."

"You certainly aren't more stupid than that bunch," Leah commented acidly. "If it weren't for Jake and Sam running the show, they wouldn't have two brain cells to rub together between them."

That drew a small smile to her brother's face, and from inside the house shouts of protest could be heard over her assessment.

Bella nudged Seth's knee with her foot.

"What you're forgetting though, Seth," she said, bringing the subject back around, "is that we know you. We know what you're really like, and so seeing you in your wolf form doesn't really bother any of us."

She shrugged.

"We can look at you and say that you look sweet or adorable or...fluffy."

Seth winced as she said the dreaded word again and Jake interjected.

"What she means, dude, is that to us you're just Seth. We don't see you as the enemy because we know you. You're one of us."

Seth shrugged, but he no longer seemed so despondent. He had sat up a little straighter.

"You'd get a different reaction if you met a leech though," Jake laughed. "Can you imagine what they think when they first see us chasing them down?"

"I remember when I first saw the pack for the first time," Bella mused, her eyes staring out into the forest blindly.

"That was when they took out the dreadlocked leach, right?" Leah asked. "Before Sethy and I phased?"

"Yeah," Jake confirmed."It was up by that meadow you wanted to find, right Bells?"

Bella hummed in agreement but didn't go into more detail. She didn't like to think about how stupid she had acted during that period of her life.

She continued. "I had pretty much resigned myself to dying out there when Laurent suddenly froze and looked right behind me. And there were all the wolves, creeping out of the forest. You all looked like monsters to me, like something out of a nightmare. I was half-convinced that if Laurent didn't kill me, then the pack definitely would. Just the sight of all those teeth, and the growling..."

She shuddered and Jake nudged her playfully with his shoulder, bringing her out of her morbid thoughts. Bella smiled and laughed off the unease she felt talking about that moment.

"Anyway, I had seen vampires attack each other before and thought the wolves didn't stand a chance. I didn't even know that you all were protecting me at first either. I couldn't understand how I was meant to shared out to be eaten by the entire pack... And don't you dare say anything, Paul!" Bella shouted towards the house.

A round of raucous laughter broke out inside. Leah had covered her mouth with one hand and Jake and Seth were both chuckling lightly.

Bella smiled and shook her head.

"I know right? I thought I would have a heart attack when you all attacked Laurent. I thought once you were done with him, then I would be next, so I ran as fast I could. It took me ages to get out of the forest and find my truck again."

Seth glanced up at her from under his eyelashes. "So you thought we were scary."

"Well yeah." Bella pulled a face at him and he laughed. "I didn't know who you were or what you were or that you didn't mean me any harm. All I knew was that you were gigantic beasts that snarled and looked like you could bite off my head in one, clean snap."

"We could, you know," Leah remarked idly. "That's how we decapitate the leeches."

Bella stared at her for a moment. "Yeah... That's something I didn't really want to know thanks."

Leah grinned, baring her teeth slightly and Jake chuckled loudly, giving his mate a fond, sloppy kiss on the side of her head.

"So," Bella addressed Seth, "I think that if, like me, a vampire or anyone else would stumble across you in the forest, I don't think they'll be thinking about how cute you look as a wolf. They'll be thinking about how to get away from you as quickly as possible before they lose a limb."

"Really?" The young boy looked so hopeful.

"Really," she replied. "When you're together as a pack, you're all completely terrifying to look at. I don't think any vampires are going to be laughing at you anytime, Seth."

He nodded. "Yeah. No, yeah. I get what you mean." He bounded up to his feet. "I can totally take a leech down by myself now."

He ignored both Bella and Leah's winces at the thought of the younger boy putting himself directly in harm's way.

Seth carried on talking, though, with renewed enthusiasm.

"And I totally beat Quil in a fight the other day. I don't know who he's calling 'puppy'. It's not like he's going to grow anymore either. If I'm already stronger than him now, then imagine just how unbeatable I'll be in a couple of years' time."

Jake exchanged a bewildered glance with Bella at Seth's sudden change of attitude.

"Plus, if you all think I'm the cutest already, then imagine just how popular I'll be with the girls at school."

He ran up to the porch and hugged his sister.

"This is going to be so cool. I'm going to go tell Mom."

With another smile that encompassed the three of them, Seth ran off happily.

They sat in bemused silence for a few minutes.

"What just happened?" Jake eventually asked.

Leah shrugged. "I don't think he's upset anymore. Turns out all it takes is reminding him that he can tear Bella to shreds if you want to cheer him up."

Jake snorted. "Gotta admit there, Bells, calling a guy adorable doesn't really do much for his self-esteem."

"But he is," Bella protested. "He's so sweet. He kind of reminds me of you a little."

"Urgh." Leah untangled herself from Jacob despite his protests and scooted away. "That's all I need, to be told the guy I'm with is just like my brother."

Bella wrinkled her nose. "Sorry. I just mean that they're both nice guys."

Jacob grinned. "And yet, you're with Paul."

"And I'm fucking awesome." The man in question burst out of the house, unable to stay away for too long. Scooping Bella up, he covered her face and neck in kisses, ignoring her squealing protests. "A lot scarier than all of you lot too."

"Aww, I don't think you're scary," Bella joked.

She looked her mate in the eyes and delivered the punch line.

"You're just like an angry kitten really."


End file.
